Sophie Blackall Illustration

Drawings and Snippets and Breaking News, (but more snippets than breaking news).

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Anatomical Drawing at the Observatory

This past weekend my daughter and I took a class at Observatory, one of my favorite places in Brooklyn. It wasn't the Anthropomorphic Mouse Taxidermy Class, because I had already taken that one, and it wasn't Organization and Productivity for Creative/Artsy Types, with Oliver Burkeman of the Guardian, because I was too disorganized to put that in my calendar, it was Comparative Anatomy: Animals and the Fundamentals of Drawing with my good friend and excellent teacher, Chris Muller.
I am one those apologetic self-taught artists, constantly surprised when something I draw actually vaguely looks like the thing it's meant to resemble. This class was brilliant. I'm not going to start drawing accurately, (I can hear your collective two or three sighs of either relief or disappointment), but it's useful to know that most people are eight times the height of their head. And that all mammals have seven neck bones. (Or was it eight?)
We also went to draw at the Museum of Natural History, and I sat on a little, floral, (borrowed) folding stool. So...much...fun.

I know there are way too many teeth. But isn't he adorably eager to please?